Animal companion
__TOC__ Having an animal companion, or pet, is a Ranger skill: Getting a Pet Pets are character-specific. To obtain a pet you must use Charm animal on an animal. Whenever a ranger has Charm Animal equipped, his pet will tag along when he is outside of cities and outposts. Getting rid of your pet It is not possible to charm a new animal while one already has a pet. The only way to get rid of a pet is to speak with Jarrel the Tamer (he can be found just outside post searing Ascalon City, or next to ranger Nente in Regent Valley (Pre-Searing)). The tamer may give a small amount of gold in exchange for an experienced pet (100 gold pieces for a level 20 pet). Giving up a pet at a tamer is final; there is no way to get it back. Pet Rules *Pets are not affected by skills that affect the whole party. They are considered an ally and as such, things like Aegis will have no effect on them. *Pets are a type of creature according to Edge of Extinction and other skills that target creatures. *A pet will always attack the same foe as its owner (sometimes with a delay) at a rate of one attack every two seconds. *Pets cannot get a Death Penalty. *When a pet dies, all of its owners' skills are disabled for 4 seconds. *When a pet dies, its location does not show as a grey dot on the compass. *Pets cannot be ressurected with Monk Skills, only with Comfort Animal, Revive Animal or Resurrection Shrine. *If a pet isn't renamed (see below), its name may change as it levels up and evolves (i.e. a Melandru's Stalker may become a Playful Stalker). *Pets gain Experience and level up (with the max level being 20) from combat. They will gain experience in this way even while dead, with no limit on the range, but will only show the experience level change when within a short distance (radar?) of the master. Pets do not gain experience from quest rewards or mission completion, and are unaffected by experience scrolls. The precise nature of pet experience gain is unknown, but they seem to level more quickly than a player of their level would. Pet attacks A pet's damage is relative to the amount of attribute points invested in its owner's Beast Mastery attribute, with diminishing returns for rank greater than the owner's Level/2 +2. Different types of pets do different types of physical damage. Slashing damage is dealt by *Black Bears *Lynxes *Melandru's Stalkers *Moa Birds *Striders* *Warthogs* *Wolves Piercing damage is dealt by *Black Widows *Dune Lizards * The Prima Guide has listed this type of pet doing a different type of damage, and many other fansites simply copied that information. However actual testing show the information in the Prima Guide to be incorrect. Health and Armor All pets have the same health and armor level based off of their current level. The armor can be modified via Otyugh's Cry. :Health = Level × 20 + 80 :AL= Level × 3 + 20 Pet Evolution Stats *Hearty: -2 damage, +60 health *Playful: -1 damage, +30 health *Elder: -0 damage, +0 health *Agressive: + 1 damage, -30 health *Dire: +2 damage, -60 health It is commonly believed that the Elder pet has a damage bonus of +3; however, attempts to validate this have shown that the Elder does indeed do less damage than the Dire by approximately 2 damage points. Training for a Specific Pet Evolution Generally, the pet evolves at levels 11 and 15. However, in certain cases this has varied; such instances are rare and not fully understood, though leveling up while dead does seem to delay evolution to the next time the pet levels up. Other times the pet name does not update appropriately; in this case, name your pet, then reset the default name with /namepet. Which evolutionary path the pet takes is dependant on the play style of its master leading up to the pet's evolution and is still undergoing research. The following factors are believed not to be involved in pet evolution: * Amount of healing on the pet * Levels of monsters fought * Number of time the pet dies * Number of foes killed by the pet The following are observed to have some correlation with offensive evolutions (Aggressive/Dire): * Low ratio of damage dealt by pet vs damage by owner * Amount of damage taken by the pet * Amount of damage taken by the pet without killing the pet The following are observed to have some correlation with defensive evolutions (Playful/Hearty): * High ratio of damage dealt by pet vs damage by owner * High absolute damage dealt by pet The Elder evolution can be aquired by playing one of the above two play styles until the pet reaches its first evolution and then changing which play style one uses. Pet Skills It's also a good idea to bring along some other pet-related skills: *Disrupting Lunge, *Tiger's Fury, *Call of Haste, *Otyugh's Cry, *Ferocious Strike, *Symbiotic Bond, *Bestial Pounce, *Brutal Strike, *Melandru's Assault, *Predator's Pounce, *Scavenger Strike, *Maiming Strike, *Comfort Animal, *Feral Lunge, *Revive Animal, *Call of Protection, *Symbiosis Pet Naming A pet can be given an individual name with the commands "/namepet " or "/petname ". The /namepet command, when used without anything following it, will reset the pet's name to its default state. A pet's name can be up to 12 characters long. Note that an individual name will also carry over to a new pet. Pet name does not effect a pet's evolution, it will simply mask the prefix displayed untill you reset the name to default. See also *A guide to pets, by Jenosavel and Epinephrine from Guild Wars Guru, extensive research with lots of tables. *Ultimate Pet Guide from Guild Wars Guru *Calling all Beastmasters: The Grand Pet Survey from GWOnline, still actively conducting research and testing theories.